


Meanwhile on the Street

by KairosImprimatur



Category: Daredevil (TV), Iron Fist (TV), Jessica Jones (TV), Luke Cage (TV), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Defenders (Marvel TV), The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, F/M, Gen, I haven't even proofread this, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Putting the MCU back in Netflix MCU, The Snapture, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 09:04:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14517048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KairosImprimatur/pseuds/KairosImprimatur
Summary: What happens to everyone else? The ones who didn't know anything except what they saw on the news?MAJOR SPOILERS FOR AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR!





	Meanwhile on the Street

**Author's Note:**

> I have no idea if the Netflix series will address the end of Infinity War at all or if they've just given up on keeping continuity with the movies, but this is my take on the snap through the perspectives of the five main characters. 
> 
> Also I don't know why people like me need to somehow make this brutal turn of events even worse, but here we are. Read on if and only if you're okay with your heart being ripped out all over again.

The first one happened as Matt was about to leave his apartment, dressed in his suit and tie, cane in hand, and his first thought was that he should change. He couldn’t explain what he had just heard: a neighbor going about her business whose body had suddenly lost mass, disintegrated even, air rushing to fill the vacuum that replaced her existence. It could have been a terrifying new kind of weapon, she could have been something inhuman all along, it could even be his own senses betraying him, but whatever was going on, Daredevil had a better chance at dealing with it than Matt Murdock did.

Then there was another. The apartment on the other side, an old man who lived alone. Matt dropped his cane. He had to do something. There had to be a way. Someone screamed as her husband and child crumbled away. All around, people didn’t even know that anything was wrong until they saw it or, God save their souls, they were the ones taken away. Matt knew. He was the only one. He had to do something. It could be Foggy next. Karen. So many innocents could be lost. 

It was a terrible relief to realize that there was no way to stop it. It was a dizzying horror to realize that he was going to survive.

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“Morning, Jessica!” rang out a child’s voice through the closed door.

Jessica chuckled as the greeting was followed by Oscar’s exasperated urgings, “Indoor voice, Vito, it’s too early for that. C’mon buddy, pick up the pace or you’re gonna miss the bus.” 

She checked the time and then looked out the window. The school bus was at the corner, and Oscar and Vito had just made it to the elevator: it was more than likely that they were going to miss it. In fact, the bus was coming a lot more quickly than it should. She stood up, concerned. Now the bus was skidding to the side.

In the space of a few breaths she was down the stairs and out the door, getting herself between the bus and the nearest building just in time to stop the collision. Panting, she tried to get a look at the driver, but there was nothing to be seen inside the bus except a few screaming children.

Oscar was just a few paces away, but crouched and staring at the sidewalk as if it were somehow more interesting than a nearly crashed school bus. She rushed to his side. “Where’s Vito?” No reply. She shook his shoulder. “Is he inside? Is he okay?”

A man was running over to the bus. Jessica straightened up to go talk to him, but in mid-stride, he turned to dust and the dust blew away on a breeze. Oscar finally looked up, met her eyes, and shook his head.

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Luke stood patiently, the massive steel beam held over his head, while the workers got their machinery into place behind him and a small crowd of locals, mostly children, began to assemble in front of him.

“You a construction man now?” called a young woman with a flirtatious smile. “Or just a piece of art they commissioned to put some bling in the hood?”

“Neither,” Luke called back. “I’m a jack.” He shifted the beam to one hand to point a warning finger at one of the kids. “Don’t you put one foot any closer than that. This is a hard hat area, you see the sign?”

“You don’t have a hard hat!” the boy replied, delighted with his own perspicacity, and another kid immediately took up the debate with him: “He don’t _need_ a hard hat, he’s Luke Cage!”

The woman who had called him a piece of art started laughing. “He got a hard head instead!”

“He got unbreakable skin!”

“Nothin’ can hurt Luke Cage, not ever!”

That didn’t have to be true, not completely, but he should have been able to hold the beam. Instead he felt it shifting, falling, and to his intense confusion, he saw it was because his left arm was decomposing. It hurt. He tried to stay up -- the kids were afraid, they needed him -- but there wasn’t enough of him left. The beam dropped into the space where Luke Cage had been.

//////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\//////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\//////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

The surreal thing about it was that Ward had just been arguing that if he fell apart, the whole company would fall apart. Those were his last words. Danny watched him literally falling apart and wondered why the walls around them weren’t doing the same.

Colleen was behind him, whispering, “Oh my God,” and it was enough to bring Danny back to himself. Enough, at least, to remember who he was. He had a sacred duty. Whatever this was, whoever had attacked, they had made an enemy of the Immortal Iron Fist.

Both of his hands were glowing, but Colleen was nonetheless staring at him with abject terror. “Danny,” she said, reaching out, “Danny, Danny, Danny, Danny…!”

If it came for her now, he realized, he could do nothing to fight it. He was going to have to watch her die.

Colleen’s hands passed right through his face as it turned to dust. “Danny!” he heard her cry one last time. His fists were the last to go.

//////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\//////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\//////////\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\

Frank rolled over to face Karen as she woke. She yawned and scrubbed a hand across her eyes before murmuring, “You’re still here? Time is it?”

He propped himself up on an elbow and brushed her hair back behind her ear. “Early. We oughta take it slow today, for once. You rest as long as you want.”

“Nah, I’m up,” she said, but instead of getting out of bed, she threw an arm over his bare chest and leaned her head on his shoulder. “Does taking it slow mean breakfast at the diner? I’ve been dreaming about their waffles.”

She hadn’t properly removed all of her makeup before falling asleep last night, and Frank was fixated on a smudge of mascara on her cheek, still amazed by how consistently beautiful she was. The novelty should have worn off by now, but instead, every new circumstance just reinforced the point. “Waffles,” he agreed softly.

Karen sat up, letting the blankets pool in her lap as she covered her mouth for another yawn. Halfway into it, she suddenly coughed and clutched her midriff. “Frank, something’s happening,” she said in a frightened rush.

Instantly he had his hands on her face, but her eyes held no answers and his senses found nothing wrong with her body. There were no intruders. The world around them seemed the same. He could feel a change in his own body, but his fear for Karen wouldn’t let him examine it until he saw his own hands discorporating.

“I love you, Karen,” he said, the only words that time would allow him.

Karen fell away before his eyes, the last of her mingling in the air with the last of him. “I love you…”


End file.
